Hmmm dont know if this has been mentioned b4 on this forum ( been gone for long time )
i got h4 now almost a week (not mine tho i can have it until my friend gets a new pc that can handle h4 )

does any1 think that create illusion is bit to strong ?? coz today i had like 3 heroes with the spell and 132 genies enemy attacked me and i thought im gonna lose big time .... my genie's turn i cast create illusion on their thunderbirds ( those birds are sooo f*cking beautifull !!@ ) so i got like 16 thunderbirds then my heroes cast it to 27 thunderbirds and every round i cast it again... and i had other hero casting ( dont remember spell name ) a spell on their thunderbirds so the cant attack i won the battle with few loses ...

yeah, genies (and water elemental) are very powerful. If your hero knows Phantom Image, you can use it to add creatures to the illusion stack also. Phantom Image is an improved version of Create Illusion.

But in multiplayer I suppose the create illusion spell is less useful, because human player will cast dispel magic to instantly eliminate the illusion stack.

Right you are. Illusion is a damn good spell for creating e.g. loads of thunderbirds. Only that these birds can all be destroyed by a level 1 order mage (i might be wrong): cast dispel on them, and - poof! -- they are all gone.

The 1st level death spell, Cancellation, can also get rid of them.
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"I am both selfish and instictive. I value nature and the world around me as means to an end as well as an end in itself; at best I ... too long to display...

No, I don't think Illusion is that powerful, since ,as you said, there are at least TWO first level spells that can easily make all your Illusions a total waste of spell points.

But I aslo have one question. The anti magic spell; is it in HOMM4, and can it be used on illusions?
I don't really think this spell combo is too realistic, since the anti magic is like a level 3 or 4 nature spell, and illusion is a 2nd level order...
____________"Sometimes I think everyone's just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending to be brave is how you get brave, I don't know."
- Grenn, A Storm of Swords.

If your Genies could create 16 T-birds, then one ice Bolt from them would have killed 16 T-birds.

If you then had spells to take away the turns of the most dangerous opponent stacks, then you will win this combat with few losses, and it probably doesn't matter if you bolt them or create your own new creatures.

Big stacks of direct damage dealing spellcasters are lethal in H4.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"

Well, it doesn't sound too logical, but i found out yesterday that alot of other spells (like Spiritual armour, Haste, Blur) works just fine on Illusions. So it could be that this combo actually is realistic... imagine, it would boost the power of Order to previously unimagineable heights!
____________"Sometimes I think everyone's just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending to be brave is how you get brave, I don't know."
- Grenn, A Storm of Swords.

Yes, we all know about dispel.
But did you mean that dispel can be used to remove anti-magic?
____________"Sometimes I think everyone's just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending to be brave is how you get brave, I don't know."
- Grenn, A Storm of Swords.

Actually, what I think he's trying to say, is that Anti-magic, since it removes all existing spells on the target (in addition to making it immune to magic), should also dispel the illusions. I haven't tried it, but it just might work.

Quote:Actually, what I think he's trying to say, is that Anti-magic, since it removes all existing spells on the target (in addition to making it immune to magic), should also dispel the illusions. I haven't tried it, but it just might work.

yes, that is what i meant. anti-magic is in itself, well, anti-magic, while illusions are one of the most magical pieces of furniture one can conjure up... heh, create illusions of those enemy behemoths, cast cat reflexes, first strike, bless, fire shield, speed and spiritual armor on it and you are good to go. until you win or the enemy flees, whichever comes first. :-)
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I am chaos impersonated.

Ok while you people here were dreaming whether or whether not it might work (removing illusions with anti-magic) I tried some things out.

I tried it in a illusions-and-such-created-by-myself situation.
To make a nice full list a 2player game would be required.

It seems that:
Casting antimagic on your illusions or animated dead, removes them!!! Wow!
Casting antimagic on raised undead or summoned creatures, just gives them antimagic. That protects them against dispel and cancellation, but:
Casting dispel on your own raised undead and summonings, can not be done. I guess such creatures don't suffer much from dispel and cancellation at all, so no need to protect.
Casting dispel on your own illusions or animated dead, removes them! I guess exorcism is a better way to help them!
Casting cancellation on your own units is impossible under all circumstances.

I was wondering what 'steal enchantment' is gonna do. Will you be the new master of such illusions?
It must be tested in a 2player game, or in a fight against genies when you have 100% magresist, and a one-man army.

I guess the 'Ring of Permanency' is a good artifact in multiplayer games? It should protect against dispel, cancellation and steal enchantment. So your illusions should be safe then?

If you want a nice list of what spells can be cast on illusions, get Wub's list of special creature immunities, somewhere at maphaven. He did the research, I gave his list a nice Word-layout. You can see there that mechanicals and illusions are not immune to blind, but undead creatures are, for example.

If you want to complete the above research, you would have to find out:
*what cancellation on enemy raised/animated/illusion/summoned creatures does.
*trying whether you can use anti-magic to remove enemy animations/illusions.
*what dispel on enemy raised/animated/illusion/summoned creatures does.
*what steal enchantment on enemy raised/animated/illusion/summoned creatures does.

Cancellation on Raised: Removes beneficial spells
Cancellation on Animated: Removes them.
Cancellation on Summoned: Leaves the stack and when enemy is summoning another, the new stack will apear.
Cancellation on Illusions: Removes them.